Ceres Chaos [Exosuit Progression]

Half of the viewers stood up in fury, shouting as many curses as they knew in their vocabulary, while others just walked away in silence, potentially having lost a massive fortune or their life savings on their bet.

This duel was probably one of the more even ones, with 50/50 odds. The viewers knew about the matchup barely two hours before it began, making it hard to do proper in-depth research.

Some of the smarter ones who were betting on legs over arms cried at the injustice and foolishness of Owen, who shouldn’t have launched a flying kick in the first place.

The global forums were flooded with posts lambasting Owen’s plays, claiming that he was throwing the match.

Many seemed to feel that if Owen didn’t go super aggressive and gotten his upper body into the same range as Braton, he would have easily won by continuously poking and chipping away at Braton’s arms.

Owen was carried away on an anti-grav stretcher while Braton walked away triumphantly towards the other side of the arena, where his supporters were.

They were cheering, laughing and crying over the gains they’d made from the bets, a good number not knowing that their source of joy was the source of loss for the opposite side of the arena!

A few minor scuffles broke out along the edges where the difference was more obvious, people fighting for the sole reason that others cannot be happier than them.

Lisa scoffed at the sight. “Fucking animals, they are even worse than us and they call us ‘outers’ like it’s a bad thing.”

She waited for Braton at the entrance to the waiting room for him to arrive, but after a good five minutes, she became worried something happened to him and finally left the room to take a peek at the arena.

Braton was doing an impromptu meet-and-greet! A few courageous girls and boys jumped out onto the edges of the floating arena, running up to him to get some autographs.

Seeing that this wasn’t prevented by the arena owners or the examination council, who were busy figuring out how to repair the arena, many reporters also took the chance to barrage him with questions!

“How do you feel about winning over the dispute of arms over legs?”

“Are you aiming to be the first outer in history to win the melee category?”

“What words do you have to say about Maddy’s mutilation of your friend and teammate Erik?”

“Please sign my arm or any part! Even my chest!”

“Kid you have to join my gym and riot group! We got the best training facilities for a fellow arm-bro like you!”

“Why were you not selected for Cardenia’s training camp despite being stronger than Ceres!”

Braton chuckled, his mind seemingly unfazed by the hard questions. Despite being only twenty years old, his body training had his height at 2 meters, slightly under Chad but much higher than the average citizen on Athen!

He gazed upon the crowd of fans and reporters as though he was a giant. “Alright boys and girls, I will only answer a few questions before you continue admiring my guns!”

“I don’t feel anything now, winning over legs was an inevitable outcome!”

“Of course, I aim to win, as should every other participant! Why come if you’re not here to win!”

“Maddy’s attack on my friend Erik was well within the rules and did not trigger the shields, and I have no further comments on that.”

“Ceres is much stronger than me, so don’t look down on him! He deserves the training camp and Maddy better watch out if he’s aiming for the crown!”

A wave of astonishment rippled through the crowd and beyond with this statement. How can an exosuit repairer be that much stronger than Braton?

Many viewers scoffed at this statement, wondering why would a melee category participant claim such an absurd view!

A few managed to recall Ceres’ astonishing burst of strength when he was fighting the middle-class slovesa that seemed to reach close to the level of Chad or even beyond, and found Braton’s words to be slightly believable.

Even Braton himself might not be able to win head-on with Chad, but Ceres had a clear shot if that same level of strength was available to him!

Braton smiled as he continued walking forward, undeterred by the crowd of people standing in front of him and blocking his way to the waiting room.

The unlucky reporters caught in front of him had to shuffle themselves out of the way, while the more courageous ones stood in front of him, standing firm with their cameras and mics outstretched.

Braton didn’t care, still walking forward as though there were no one in front of him, pushing through with his sheer body!

Eventually, the courageous ones relented, allowing him to exit the arena.

Finally, as he reached the waiting room, the reporters had to be pushed aside by guards in order for Braton to enter.

Despite the duel being long over, Braton felt an air of danger in the training room. He glanced around nervously, trying to figure out what was wrong.

“Wait a minute, where did Lisa go?”

“Good fight, popular boy. More sparring now!” Braton was suddenly under assault by a swift shadow who threw a series of rapid punches, nailing him on all the wounds that he suffered during the duel!

Despite his triumphant posture after the match, his arms were actually hurting all over. Owen’s kicks were definitely nothing to scoff at!

“Hey! Let me heal up before we spar, the next duel is in three days!” Braton whimpered as he tried to dodge the attacks using his weakened body.

“Why, not enough stamina to do a Q&A?” Lisa mocked while continually attacking. “There are no breaks in a real battle, get up and push yourself!”

***

“You shouldn’t have visited again, Trissa.” Erik weakly mumbled as he woke up to her sitting next to the bed.

She was silently reading her multi, researching the potential list of the next opponents which was coming the next day!

Trisaa had been visiting Erik every day regardless for at least three hours a day, despite having the upcoming ranged category matches! She too had entered the top 16.

“I can still train here. Researching on opponents is training.” Trissa replied as she kept her multi away and looked at Erik now that he was awake.

A sense of awkward tension settled between the two of them, not knowing what to say since having run out of topics from the first ward meeting.

“Wow I really didn’t think we’ll run out of things to share with each other, we talked so much during the last six months.” Erik laughed it off, trying to hide his awkwardness and uncertainty, while Trissa continued staring directly at him, unmoved.

“I'll fucking destroy Maddy.”

Erik sighed, scratching the back of his head. “You said that yesterday too when you were here, Trissa, but you can’t do that, he’s not in your category anyway! Focus on winning your duel and that will mean the world to me.”

“I’ll destroy anyone from that Five Families College.”

“I don’t think you want to meet them in the very first duel, it will be rough!”

Trissa stared pointedly at Erik, with anger boiling in her eyes. “Are you not frustrated? Vengeful? How can you sit here and talk about everything other than killing that fucker? How are you so innocent and pure after all that has happened to you or us during the last six months?”

Erik sighed, wanting to place his hand on Trissa’s shoulder but realized his hands were still wrapped up tight with bandages.

“I would be lying if I said I didn’t want revenge or I didn’t want to fuck him up, but Ceres got that covered for me and I trust him to do it for me. I wouldn’t want my sister to self-destruct because she’s focused on doing something for me. Focus on yourself and push forward in your own way. Ceres will fuck him up for me, you just win the category for me.”

Trissa slightly blushed when Erik said ‘sister’ but Erik continued regardless.

“Even so, I’m not innately a vengeful guy. There’s no reason to continue the cycle of hurt because someone did it to you, it escalates into a much larger thing. Can you imagine what will happen to both of us if you tried to kill Maddy in the open? I’m still under the care of the Seras Hospital officially, which means I could disappear in the night!”

“That’s exactly why Maddy maimed you and he knows you can’t do anything to him!” Trissa stood up and ‘shouted’ in the loudest voice she could potentially muster, being almost the same volume as Erik.

“And that’s okay, I’m fine with that. Now if he was planning to permanently indenture everyone here in the ward then that will be a big problem for me. But there are rules to follow and I trust the higher-ups. Maybe not the enforcers though.” Erik replied slowly.

“I mean, look at what the owner of the planet did for Ceres! There are people that care and I don’t want to hurt more people just because I’m personally hurt, that just doubles the pain everywhere else.”

“Just because bad things exist doesn’t mean good things don’t. I believe society can be saved even from my position. You already knew beforehand, my goal is to be a teacher in the orphanage, to teach kids like us to be a better person and to take things as they go. There’s no need for me to be involved in some revenge or assassination plot, and I certainly don’t want you to be involved in it.”

Trissa had tears welling up in her eyes, muttering something barely audible: “I want to be a teacher too and stay with you...”.

Erik really wished he could use his hands now, but he had to deal with it. “Look, we only found out we might be related to each other six months ago, but that’s not what family means Trissa. I will always be here for you even if you want to go off into the military or out into the stars.”

“No! We’re 100% family and you can’t keep telling me otherwise!” Trissa was adamant that they were related, potentially brother and sister due to the same exact mark they had that was in the same position between their shoulder blades.

The birthmark looked like a hot iron that was pressed into their skin, designed as a simple X with the ends rounded off to look like circles. A single dagger laid in the centre, on top of the simple X, that was obviously tattooed on much later than the said X.

Erik and Trissa both didn’t know what the mark meant or symbolized, but the striking similarity completely turned them off during the first date.

Erik was still conflicted – if he ignore the possibility of being related, was it still incest? Either way, that discovery made both of them go into a contemplative mood right after the date.

How should they treat each other from now on? It was no disguise that both of them had romantic feelings for each other.

Over the last six months they had finally sorted out all their feelings, now focused on their potential familial bond.

Maybe, in reality, they could not be related at all, receiving the same mark from different occasions. But regardless Erik would always treat Trissa as family from now on.

“Family isn’t determined just by a mark, Trissa. It’s what we do for each other. For Ceres, Braton and me, Zone 17 is our family. Don’t treat them worse than me just because they aren’t your family, otherwise, you’ll end up being the same as Maddy and the Five Families! They treat everyone outside of their ‘family’ as strangers and even those within who are incompetent are thrown to the side, we can’t stoop to that level.” Erik tried to calm Trissa down, who was still angry at Erik for trying to claim they were not family.

Trissa finally stood straight up, getting ready to leave. Erik knew that look on her face before quickly reminding her. “Okay, if you want to get revenge, you can, but be more discreet and cleaner about it! Don’t be so blatant!”

As she left the room, a dangerous grin appeared, frightening the other outers in the ward who managed to catch a glimpse of her face.

“Don’t worry, Erik, all my kills are clean.”